I took the Zoloft for the first time a couple minutes ago because I don't want to feel like this anymore. I want to actually want to hold my baby. I remember being unable to put him down, now I don't even want to look at him. How can you be angry at a 4 week old? It isn't his fault that he can't stop crying. Or that he kicks my incision and flails at my sore nipples. Or that he doesn't like to sleep at night. Most of those are because of things I have done wrong - or just can't seem to get right.
I just can't seem to get anything right. I can't sleep, I can't take care of him the way he needs, I can't connect to Adam, I can't stop crying. I can pump - I'm great at being a milk cow. That's a new life skill for my resume. I can be unreasonably angry and judging from the last couple sentences I have self pity on lock.
So I went to Dr. Bridget. She gave me a Zoloft prescription and information on a support group. She wants me to try and get as much sleep as I can (the goal being 5 uninterrupted hours - HA!) and to shower and leave the house for an hour each day. Honestly that feels like someone asking me to climb Mt. Everest each day.
This happened fast. I went from slightly overwhelmed to completely broken down in just a couple days. Of course I had been warned about Postpartum Depression, but like so much that has to do with motherhood, no one was able to accurately describe what I was in for. All it took was a couple of sleepless nights to have the thread of my sanity unravelled all over the nursery room floor.
The most lonely place in the world is the rocking chair next to Buddy’s crib at 4 am when he just WILL. NOT. SLEEP. I can't get him to go down. I can't go get Adam. I can't do anything but sit there and cry with him.
This morning Adam woke up and found me sobbing next to the pack and play, begging him to please, please, please sleep. It wasn't even the low point of the night. The low point was when I was doing the arm jiggle, which he usually loves, and I realized that I was jiggling way too hard. I stopped immediately, put him on my lap and just sat there. I just sat there until I knew I could continue rocking. I just sat there and felt like the lowest form of slime in the universe.
So Adam took over for the morning and I cried. I sobbed and wailed with a pillow over my face because I don't want to scare Buddy. I cried for so long that I got nauseous. I feel asleep crying and woke up about half an hour later starving and parched with a soaked pillow. I've eaten and gotten a couple 2 hour chunks of sleep while Adam worked from home this morning and took care of Buddy.
He just left to go to work for the afternoon. Buddy is asleep and I am sitting here, having taken my Zoloft, typing and crying again. I'll pull my Bessie routine in about 1/2 an hour and I'll just keep praying that Andrew stays asleep until Adam gets home. Because right now I am scared of my baby. I love him. I love him so much. But I recognize that today he has the power to break me into a million tiny pieces.